DigiFeature

DIGITAL FILMMAKING DIGITAL FILMMAKING
at NAB, complete with accessories head and pulled together his small
PJ and the Mysterium Chip Affair (drives, batteries, mounting systems).
However, the cameras would be ready
army and was ready to shoot a mini-
movie. How incredible is it that Peter
Zane Holmes provides the exclusive, behind-the-scenes story of the making of Peter Jackson’s short mere days before the show and there’d would embrace this with such passion!
Crossing the Line with the prototype RED ONE digital camera. be no time to ﬁlm (or, rather, shoot) On the other hand, [cameras] Boris
footage. So, with only three weeks until and Natasha were completely untested
offered a tantalising glimpse of what Jim’s words. again, as the RED team struggled to – they were assembled just a few days
L
ate March 2007: three Americans the mid-April trade show, Jim Jannard
attempt to leave the USA carry- this new breed of camera will do. This The industry buzz about the scale of satisfy their self-imposed standards. picked up the phone and called Peter before we arrived to shoot a movie, we
ing two top secret devices code- is the exclusive, behind-the-scenes story the team’s ambition reached fever pitch To put those standards in context, Jackson. didn’t really know if they would make it
named “Boris” and “Natasha”. Customs of the making of that ﬁlm. thanks to a one-two punch of announce- most existing high-end HD cameras Peter had already reserved ﬁve RED through two minutes of shooting, and
apprehend one at the border, but the ments. In the lead-up to NAB 2006, the end up recording to various types of cameras and, having watched some Peter had assembled the troops for this
team announced they’d developed tape, thus limiting their resolution to early tests in LA, had offered to ﬁeld test test. Lots of pressure here...”
T
others escape in a private jet to the South he RED camera and company
Paciﬁc where an eccentric millionaire are the brainchild of Jim Jannard, a sensor – branded the “Mysterium” HD video’s 1920 x 1080 standard, while the cameras when they were ready. After
– that would allow the capture of im- even Super 35mm ﬁlm ends up being ascertaining he was keen and available,
A
with an arsenal of WWI weapons awaits a self-confessed photo fanatic nd there was plenty more pres-
their arrival, eager to lay his hands on with a vast collection of cameras and ages at 4520 pixels by 2540 pixels; they 2048 x 871 when scanned for a digital in- Jim told Peter the date that he and his sure to go around.
the “Mysterium” chip… 30 years’ experience using them. His followed up at NAB ’06 by declaring the termediate. 4520 x 2540 is huge – every team would ﬂy down to NZ and that “You could say this was a
Although this sounds like a James love of photography extends to cinema camera would be priced at US$17,500 frame is 12 megapixels, and RED’s aim was that, leaving the small matter of rushed job,” DOP Richard Bluck says
Bond plot, it’s actually a pretty accurate and digital cameras and led him, in and they’d be manufacturing matching was up to 60 per second! what the ﬁeld test might comprise of with a wry smile and no small amount
– if melodramatically phrased – descrip- December 2005, to set about building low cost, high quality lenses. (At this Also, instead of a dedicated (and undiscussed. of irony.
tion of real events. a motion picture camera that would year’s NAB they announced the pricing potentially limiting) tape recorder, they “Jim and the RED team got on their Indeed – the two prototype cameras
The imminent release of the RED overcome the shortfalls of the existing for the RED Prime Set – ﬁve lenses for were intending to output pure data plane before I had ﬁgured out what to arrived in Wellington on the Wednesday
ONE camera will herald, many believe, ﬁlm and digital ranges. US$19,975, or about the cost of a single to “RED Drives” or solid-state media shoot. They had no idea, other than a at about 7pm and the team was shoot-
a new way of making ﬁlms and a new “I wanted to build a camera for 35mm prime lens.) dubbed “RED RAM” that they would ‘test’, and neither did I!” recalls Peter. ing by 5.30am on the Friday. Which
perception of the costs involved with myself that no other company seemed Doubt, incredulity, even anger fol- also manufacture. “I did think about a few boring ideas wouldn’t have been too big a deal if
ﬁlmmaking. In March the RED Digital interested to build,” recalls Jim. “My lowed this announcement, but there The question of how so much data involving scenery, jet boats, etc. I was not for the fact that Boris and Natasha
Cinema Camera Company ﬂew two bet was that there might be others who was a greater groundswell of excitement and such large images could be handled trying to think what we could do that were essentially two blocks of machined
of the prototype (alpha) cameras to would be interested in it as well...” that ﬁnally there was a product in the had been answered at NAB ’06 – a com- would make their trip worthwhile, and steel with a PL mount at one end where
Wellington and Peter Jackson became A tall order perhaps, but – thanks works with the potential to be consid- pression codec called REDcode would put the camera through its paces in the a lens could be ﬁtted and a start/stop
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the ﬁrst ﬁlmmaker to put the camera to founding the Oakley sunglasses ered in many respects better than ﬁlm, reduce the amount of data by a factor right kind of way. button – and that was it… No controls
through its paces; two weeks later, the company in 1975 – Jim is a billionaire rather than the promise of many HD of 10, while work was underway with “So they were in the air, and we were for shutter speed (angle) frame rate, no
ﬁnished ﬁlm was shown to much ac- with a background in manufacturing formats to be “as good as ﬁlm”. Apple to integrate a RED workﬂow into putting a crew together. Whatever we viewﬁnder (it hadn’t been built yet), not
claim at the NAB conference in Las and optics, arguably making him the At this stage customers could reserve Final Cut Pro. However, these solutions were going to shoot had to happen even any handles to hold the cameras
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Vegas. (Yes, you read that correctly – the ideal person to set about rocking the a camera for US$1000, with the com- were largely theoretical and, as each within 48 hours of their arrival. with. So the team had just one day to
words “Peter Jackson”, “two weeks”, and cinema camera boat. pany hoping RED ONE would be ready deadline was missed, the number of “Because of my involvement with the test video splits and camera monitors,
“ﬁnished ﬁlm” being used in the same He began by pulling together a team to ship by the end of 2006. However, as naysayers increased. Omaka Easter Airshow, I had access to as well as build some sort of cage so
sentence!) of experts and forming a private com- late as April this year there were still only a collection of WWI equipment that we the prototypes could be hand-held,
With RED set to ship worldwide in pany with a single purpose – to build a a few photos and snippets of footage use for the live re-enactments during the and ﬁnd ways to mount and power the
C
ome early 2007 and RED team
the next few months to thousands of digital cinema camera that would “skip online for public consumption – release was conﬁdent they’d be able to show. I thought we could put some of recording drives, not to mention power
pre-order customers, Peter’s short ﬁlm several generations of evolution”, in dates had been delayed, and delayed present working factory models that to use, and ﬁlm a little battle scene, the actual cameras.
which would be the ultimate ‘ﬁeld test’ Adding to the challenge was the
Images: camera op Peter Jackson; DOP Richard Bluck
for the camera. Within a few hours, our fact that Jarred Land, the RED team
producer Caro Cunningham had sent authority on the actual operation of
Dan Hennah to Masterton to create a the camera, was stopped by US customs
WWI battle ﬁeld, Matt Appleton and due to an expired passport and so didn’t
his WETA Workshop team were pulling make it to Wellington until the day
together uniforms and equipment, and the actual shoot started. Fortunately,
a group of WWI re-enactors were driving notes Jabez Olssen, who edited the
down from Auckland. short, “everyone is a jack of all trades
“A key moment came at about the at RED”, and Deanan DaSilva – the
time the RED team were landing in other member of the RED team and
Wellington,” Peter says. “I was bringing their on-the-ground workﬂow expert War, huh, yeah, what is it good for?: Making a gripping 12-minute short film in
my partner Fran Walsh up to speed – had no real problems answering all a matter of days, apparently… Three screen-grabs from Crossing the Line.
with the plans, telling her about how the probing technical questions the Kiwi
cool this battle scene would be, with 30 camera crew peppered him with.
extras, three aircraft, two ﬁeld guns and In addition, as Peter’s team set – and one out of ﬁve times it won’t work, backdrops of bright sunlight as well
a tank. She looked me in the eye and about modifying Arri base plates to ﬁt we don’t know why. The RED recording as vistas of storm clouds. The crew
said, ‘Haven’t you forgotten the most the RED they also discovered the only light won’t go on and you just have to shot in the pre-dawn, in the harsh
important thing?’ I kind of blinked with monitoring out of the camera was via restart.” Fortunately, Richard Bluck’s Kiwi midday sunlight and after dark,
confusion, and she said, ‘A script’. We a 720P HDMI connector or an HD-SDI team solved this issue for RED when although the story is meant to take
talked about a few ideas, and I didn’t connector. As a result they had to com- they discovered that, when the camera place over just a few minutes during
get much sleep. mandeer video split systems from Wel- and its accessories were powered up in “golden hour”.
“First thing in the morning, we had lington rental outﬁt Rubber Monkey’s a speciﬁc order, it started up every time, Besides the technical issues, Peter
our ﬁrst production meeting – this was two Grass Valley Viper kits. guaranteed. also had a pressing creative dilemma
the day before the shoot. The RED guys In lieu of the yet-to-be-manufactured So after one hectic day the team had as well. “The last minute appearance
were there, and Jim says, ‘So I hear RED viewﬁnders, Boris and Natasha the cameras ﬁghting trim, although a of an actual plotline meant we needed
we’re shooting a WWI epic?’ I sat with were ﬁtted with Marshall 7" HD-SDI couple of potential snags remained a couple of young lead actors,” he says.
everyone and pitched the little storyline monitors, and because the RED Drives – the cameras would only shoot at “We turned to friends and family for
involving a photograph and teddy bear. weren’t ready, off-the-shelf 10,000 24fps, the shutter angle was ﬁxed at help and Sarah Peirse and Philippa
There was never a written script, and RPM Barracuda SATA drives were 180 degrees and, of most concern to Boyens offered up their sons, Tom
I kept reﬁning the storytelling right used. And because the alpha models Richard, the cameras’ dynamic range Hobbs and Calum Gittens, who did a
through the shoot.” couldn’t power the drives as the RED was two stops less than the ﬁnal RED terriﬁc job.”
Jim Jannard took it all largely in his production-line cameras will, dedicated ONE will have when it ships. Once out in the ﬁeld, the majority
stride. “When we landed and heard the power supplies for the drives had to be of operating was done by Peter and
plan, we were thrilled and terriﬁed at jerry-rigged.
A
s the ﬁrst shoot day dawned Neil Blomkamp [the director named
Photo: Jim Jannard
the same time,” he says. “In the time Then, Jabez says, another problem on March 30, the skies over for the on-hold Halo].
it takes to ﬂy from Orange County to raised its head: “Jim said, ‘You connect Masterton conspired to test “These two prototypes were way
Wellington, Peter built a story in his all these things – the drives, the batteries the cameras’ latitude by throwing up heavier than we imagined,” says Pe-
Winging it: At Hood Aerodrome, just outside Masterton, Peter Jackson briefs pilot Gene Demarco about the aerial combat
18
sequence in short ﬁJULY 2007 camera test Crossing the Line.
lm/RED www.onfilm.co.nz www.onfilm.co.nz JULY 2007 19
DIGITAL FILMMAKING DIGITAL FILMMAKING
ter. “They were nothing more than a being recorded to disk, a deliberate is Peter, down in the dirt, hand-hold- honouring April Fool’s Day.) had time to sync the sound. So while duction period, WETA Digital’s I/O name as part of their clip names,” says Clare Burlinson ﬂew down from Auck-
camera body, so all the extra stuff like feature that allows operators to see ing Boris and directing the hero while The next day Jabez and Peter sat they edited mute, Rhys synced the department had been working with Jabez, “so we were able to refer back land and graded the ﬁlm over two days
monitors, batteries, disc drives, etc had what’s just outside their frame while shooting – with a big smile on his face. down to edit the 4K rushes on Final rushes on a MacBook Pro laptop using RED in order to capture the 4K footage from the timeline (or EDL) to those under the guidance of Richard Bluck
to be bolted on to a bulky set of rods they’re rolling (and something ﬁlm Peter was literally in the trenches for Cut Pro… copies of the 4K media. so the WETA vfx artists could realise sev- parts of the original REDcode ﬁles we and Peter.
that we jerry-rigged. I found myself cameras’ optical viewﬁnders generally two days of shooting.” I pause here to let that sink in – yes, (It’s time once again to pause and to eral vfx shots involving the dog-ﬁghting required for the online. There was, In case you’re wondering, the ﬁlm
handholding an awkward 40lb tangle allow for). As for Peter’s experience of camera they were editing 4K on an-off-the-shelf let that sink in… 4K media was being biplanes exchanging tracer ﬁre. however, no timecode or reel names, was graded in a 709 linear colourspace
of equipment for two days – which of Also operating on the shoot were operating on his own ﬁlm for the ﬁrst Mac Pro with Final Cut Pro, when most edited on a lap top!) WETA’s Nick Booth, Lucas Putnam which made things trickier.” rather than log colourspace, due to
course is no reﬂection on what the Richard Bluck on Steadicam and time in over a decade? “I loved it,” he suites are still struggling with regular HD Rhys passed over the clips with sound and their teams had been under con- After a little trial and error the right a limitation with REDcine – while in-
ﬁnished RED camera rigs will be.” James Cowley for the aerial shots in enthuses. “For me the dynamic on set resolutions. Just how is this possible? as they were done and Jabez dropped siderable pressure to work out the best frames were found, converted to 4K tended to be able to extract log ﬁles,
While Jim and the RED team would the Heliworks chopper ﬂown by Alﬁe if I’m operating is so different to blob- Well, when the RED camera captures those required into the edit. (When way to extract the frames required for DPX ﬁles and passed onto Park Road. RED team had not tested it and were
probably have liked each shot pre-lit and Speights. bing in a chair in front of a monitor, its footage as REDcode ﬁles (RAW and the RED ONE ships there will be both vfx from the REDcode 4K ﬁles – and in Head of DI Adam Scott and techni- much more conﬁdent with a rec709
made as gorgeous looking as possible, The team used a set of Cooke S4 waiting for things to happen. It’s way recording to tape over HD-SDI are also the ability to record up to four tracks a format the vfx team could use. With cal operations supervisor Phil Oatley workﬂow. (For those unacquainted
Peter left such niceties behind as he Prime lenses, a set of Zeiss standard more stimulating from a creative and options) it compresses the footage to a of uncompressed audio and timecode only eight days to NAB, the problem were on hand to get the ﬁles fed into with these terms a very basic explana-
kept the crew moving relentlessly for- lenses, an 18-70mm Optimo Zoom energy point of view. I’d need to con- 10:1 ratio ﬁle (ie, the data recorded to functionality to make syncing either needed to be solved by Thursday’s the Quantel Pablo DI suite (DPX ﬁles tion is that HD video generally grades
ward and the shoot transformed from and a 24-290mm Optimo Zoom, and sider the circumstances of a particular disk takes up a tenth of the space of the redundant or a lot easier. With these handover meeting – where Peter would are individual frames although like in a 10-bit linear colourspace, whereas
a camera test to Peter simply telling Richard felt there was no discernible project, but will try to operate a lot more data the sensor actually captured) using
the story to the best of his consider- difference between his experience with from now on. However, I couldn’t oper- a wavelet-based method. I’m going to
able abilities. Because the hard drives these lenses on a ﬁlm camera and using ate on something as complex as Lord forego trying to explain exactly how
allowed for up to an hour’s footage, them with the RED. Of The Rings, just because of the need this works as I must admit I’m out of
my depth – you’ll just have to trust that
the wavelet theory has been around for
about a century and seems to work.
What’s important is this compres-
sion allows RED to create Quicktime
reference ﬁles that reference the 4K
ﬁles and down-convert the footage in
real time to predetermined sizes. As a
result, Jabez had the option of work-
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ing with a 1K (ie, about the size of
widescreen standard deﬁnition image)
or 2K reference ﬁle. In the end they
edited at 1K as they found the 2K a bit
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jerky on playback due to the Mac not
being quite grunty enough to process
that resolution in real time.
Jabez then imported the 1K Quick-
time reference ﬁles (one for each
individual shot recorded) into Final
Cut, a process that was almost instan-
taneous. Now Final Cut was linked to
the 4K camera ﬁles that remained on
external FireWire drives and by using
the wavelet technology was able to play,
down-convert to 1K and edit in real
Photo: Jim Jannard
time – all without the time-consuming
process of transcoding the footage to
a lower resolution.
Photo: Jim Jannard
In the future the reference Quick-
Product shots: Peter Jackson with the jerry-rigged handheld conﬁguration of the alpha prototype on Crossing the Line; times will be generated by the RED
inset – beta prototype “Mars”, a handheld conﬁguration currently being used in Prague on the feature Wanted, which is camera itself but for this ﬁeld test they
being directed by Timur Bekmambetov (Night Watch, Day Watch). had to be generated in post. Since the Shooting in no man’s land: From left to right are grip Maurice (Moose) Kapua, production manager Carey Johnson, Garth Michael, RED’s Jarred Land, camera
camera breaks every take up into 2GB op/director Peter Jackson, DOP Richard Bluck, and grip Dion Hartley. (For a proﬁle shot of RED on sticks, click here.)
Peter would frequently shoot 20 minute The shoot went largely without a to monitor two or three other units, chunks, there was a separate clip for
takes, leading Jabez to speculate that a hitch, except for the footage shot from and deal with a hundred questions each two minute section of a take. Worse features unavailable for the shoot, the outline the vfx he needed and what he targas they can be put in a Quicktime scanned ﬁlm is usually graded in a
new system of continuity may need to the helicopter on the ﬁrst day, all of between set-ups. still, a technical error in the form of an age old clapperboard did the job just expected of the shots – if the effect art- “wrapper”). Once in the Pablo, Adam 12-bit log colour space.) At press-time,
be developed to accommodate such which was lost due to the hard drives not “After a couple of days lugging that incorrect setting on the Quicktimes re- ﬁne.) ists were to have a hope of delivering edited out all the handles that had been however, Richard was regrading the ﬁlm
an approach – in fact, continuity may being able to withstand the vibrations camera around, every muscle was so sore sulted in a ﬁve frame jump cut between The only real snag Jabez faced dur- their shots in time to be shipped to LA placed on each shot for safety, placed in log space, which he feels is providing
simply have to be done retrospectively (an issue the solid state RED RAM will I could barely walk. So the RED shoot these separate sections when they were ing the edit was the fact that while Final for the grade. the shots in the correct edited order a better result, including “an expanded
to log all the individual moments and overcome). The problem was solved by has had the added beneﬁt of sending joined up again in FCP. This problem Cut Pro was able to read REDcode ﬁles, Then, on Friday 6 April, RED team and then they made sure the 4K edited colour palate and a more organic feel
angles captured in these long takes. running the maximum length of cable me scurrying back into the gym.” was rectiﬁed by using Apple’s Cinema it couldn’t render them. announced they’d like the ﬁlm con- sequence in the Pablo matched the 1K in the highlight areas”.
Meanwhile, while the camera team possible from the camera to the drive, Tools software to change the playback “It meant that we had to either cut formed at 4K and graded in Wellington Quicktime reference of the off-line edit Then, once VFX shots were dropped
was shooting, Deanan was diligently tak- which was placed in the helicopter’s speed of the Quicktimes slightly. in a sequence set to the REDcode co- by Peter’s people. While ﬂattering, this provided by Jabez. into the edit and graded, video post
F
ollowing the shoot Deanan
ing the footage from the cameras and cabin, and having someone lie on the handed Jabez copies of the (Of course, for an R&D assignment dec and never do anything that would did turn up the heat on WETA’s I/O was complete.
copying it for safety, as well as running ﬂoor to nurse the drives through the like this, these problems are pretty require rendering,” he says, “or else cut team by several degrees – rather than Parallel to this process, Chris Ward
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rushes, which totalled about ow they were ready to grade…
spot checks and tests in the little space shot. As a result the aerial footage from 600GB (or roughly seven hours of foot- minor. I mention them by way of em- in another codec and render every bit extracting the frames required for vfx, well, almost. Peter headed into – who had recorded much of the loca-
that had been made for him in the day two (Saturday 31 March) came age). The RED team were preparing to phasising how important this change of footage. So we cut in REDcode, then they now needed to extrapolate the the Pablo suite and worked tion sound – had been creating the
camera truck. By the second day Jabez out ﬁne. ﬂy out on Sunday 1 April when Jabez to the post-production process is, one when the cut was locked we changed entire ﬁlm. This meant Nick, Lucas with Adam to resize, reframe or dy- nightmarish trench warfare soundscape
had a Final Cut suite set up on location “It was one of the most incredible had his major panic-inducing moment that will lead quite quickly to online – ie, the sequence settings to MJPEG-A and and team had to delve into the roughly namically rack nearly every shot in the with colleague Brent Burge and their
so they started testing the footage on experiences of my life to watch Peter,” of the shoot – the drive with his copy HD – conforms of your edit being done rendered the cut so we could do some 605,000 frames Peter had shot and ﬁlm using the Pablos DVE features. team. Once they had the sound locked
that as well. says Jim Jannard of the shoot. “The of the footage wouldn’t mount on almost instantly as you switch from the resizing etc in FCP.” retrieve the 18,000 or so in the ﬁnal “We did a lot of blow ups just to see and Peter approved it, it was loaded
Jarred Land ﬁnally arrived in-coun- speed at which he worked was mind- his computer, making it potentially 1K “virtual” proxy ﬁles to the actual 4K Four long days later, the edit was ﬁlm and convert them to DPX ﬁles, how far we could push this stuff,” says onto a hard drive, while the ﬁnal 4K
try and was on set by the middle of the boggling. He has built a team of trained unusable, and there was a frantic dash output of the exact same media.) ﬁnished on Thursday 5 April, and ready for grading. (There’s software Adam. “On some shots we would’ve pictures were loaded onto a separate
ﬁrst day, where he was able to give the professionals that love to work with him to the airport to secure another copy Peter and Jabez had their ﬁrst real op- called REDcine Pull List in the works blown up at least 60-80% and there’s FireWire drive as 4K DPX ﬁles (a process
shooting team some helpful pointers – you can feel Peter’s enthusiasm while portunity to relax and watch the whole that among other features will automate that took three hours, even though the
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before the RED jet left. (It later turned ith NAB now only 12 days no loss of anything in there.”
– like the fact that the image Peter and he works and it is contagious. I have out that swapping the “problem drive” away Peter and Jabez had ﬁlm roll down at the vfx handover this process.) Camera shakes to match the off- ﬁlm is only 12 minutes long), and yet
the crew were seeing on the monitors a thousand mental pictures from the to a different enclosure ﬁxed the is- to crack into the editing meeting. “All the Quicktimes we were cutting screen and on-screen explosions were another drive carried an exact copy of
was considerably larger than what was shoot and the one I’ll carry the longest sue, perhaps it was the drive’s way of before assistant editor Rhys Bonney Since the extremely brief pre-pro- with had the original magazine and ﬁle also added at this point, before colourist Continued on page 29
20 JULY 2007 www.onfilm.co.nz www.onfilm.co.nz JULY 2007 21
DIGITAL FILMMAKING DIGITAL FILMMAKING
Digital Devil, Magic
Film user-friendly DOP Duncan Cole discusses shooting The Last Magic Show, for which he’s been nominated for technical contribution to a digital feature
in the upcoming NZ Screen Awards, and The Devil Dared Me To, which is in contention for best digital feature.
Prestige results
camera redeﬁnes The Last Magic Show
I’d met Andy Conlan a few years before
we started on TLMS, while shooting a
was in front of the camera, on a shoot
which had to move pretty fast most of
the time, was a big job.
never seen any Back Of The Y, so when
producer Karl Zorab emailed me about
shooting a digi feature about a kiwi
and could be set up to act a lot like a
ﬁlm camera with variable frame rate
up to 60fps and the equivalent of a
on standard
the state-of-art short he had written (and was starring
in). He showed me an early draft of the
script not long after that, and I liked it
The viewﬁnder on any 2/3in camera
is a pretty terrible place to watch the ac-
tion from. It’s monochrome, contrasty
stuntman I was kinda dubious.
I had just got back from a month-
long photography job in Asia and I was
jetlagged and sick, but Karl persuaded
variable shutter angle from 0 to 360
degrees – pretty cool tricks for a digital
camera.
The trade-off for the tricks is in reso-
deﬁnition budgets
right away. It has a very straight-faced and is more of a framing guide for the
humour to it that I was keen to see operator than anything else. Much as me to come meet director/actor Chris lution, with the Varicam recording 720
brought to life. I like to be operating the camera, we Stapp and producer/actor Matt Heath. lines rather than the 1080 recorded by
The script is the story of Ronnie realised early on that I would have to be Despite intending to politely decline, most HD formats.
Roman, a down-and-out stage magi- in front of a monitor if I was going to I came away from that meeting with After testing and using a wide
cian trying to make a comeback, set in be Andy’s eyes and ears as well as DOP. a copy of the script and a “welcome range of ENG style zooms on SD video
a non-speciﬁc time and place. There is We were lucky to get great operators in aboard” handshake. I got home with the cameras, the cine-style zoom was a
a Victorian ﬂavour to Ronnie, and to Matt Meikle and Dev Verma, and the fearful realisation that not only had I real improvement in both quality and
the ‘Fancy Magic Show’ he performs whole process worked well. been tricked, but it appeared the project usability.
in, and Andy wanted to give the ﬁlm a was being run But the real treat was C4’s set of Fuji-
bit of a ‘period’ feel but still have it set by maniacs. non prime lenses. While not really part
in contemporary times. That night I of our kit, C4 let us use them whenever
So we chose locations carefully, and read the script, they were not booked, and for the ﬁrst
the visual style was quite restrained – not which made time I got to see really impressive lens
too much colour or movement. me laugh ’til I performance on a 2/3in camera.
As with so many of the decisions, the hurt, and I was As with The Last Magic Show, having
ON
format was determined by the budget hooked. the director in front of the camera a lot
(or lack thereof), so from the outset we Chris really of the time meant I had to stay focussed
were committed to shooting principally loaded me up on a lot more than just lighting and
on a standard deﬁnition tape format. with visual refer- composition so as to back Chris up.
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There was nothing about the script ence. I spent a From the moment I looked into the
that warranted the use of a handicam week watching Varicam viewﬁnder, I knew this meant
– the story has a quirky deadpan-ness documentaries I would once again be in front of a
to it, which would have been under- about suicidal monitor with an operator behind the
mined by a handheld camera or a lot stunts, and a camera. The electronic viewﬁnder was
of crazy moves. This meant we got to More bangs/format/suck: The most challenging thing about shooting The whole raft of truly terrible, and no accurate calls on
look at 2/3in cameras, which is really Devil Dared Me To for DOP Duncan Cole “was deﬁnitely using a digital format Evil Kineval do- composition, lighting or focus could
the best-case scenario in terms of lens to get good footage of over-big, over-bright explosions. Especially shooting cos, bios and be made without checking some sort
SRW-1 explosions at night. That just sucked.” dramatisations. of external monitor. HDW-F900R
and image quality.
For a ﬁlm-based DOP, the world He also got me The shoot was 33 days – shooting
of SD tape, with its ever-growing ag- I think we shot 23 days. It’s just a watching TV shows from the ’70s and around three minutes a day. Once the
gregation of cameras and formats, is distant, blurry, sleep-deprived memory ’80s, action movies, and to top it all off shoot ﬁnished and the edit started,
a daunting place at the beginning of now. I watched Top Gun three times. Chris and Matt started coming up with
a project. The post production process was We decided the best way to make it ideas for detail shots and close-ups to
F23 Sifting through the options exposed slow and painful. It seemed no provision funny was to shoot it in the most serious make the cut funnier. So began the
an early favourite – the Panasonic had been made for any sort of post, and way possible (think about that next time pick-up shots.
SDX900 recorded a progressive scan Andy just hooked into editing the ﬁlm you watch Top Gun), to really shoot it like Pick-ups became the weekend hobby
mode, on a true widescreen (16:9) himself at home using miniDV copies a ‘movie’, rather than a documentary for the next year or so. They started on
F23 acquisition camera HDW-F900R HD production camcorder
2/3in chip, which satisﬁed my principal of the camera tapes. This took more or a crazy TV comedy. Varicam, with a skeleton crew, and slowly
• New creative tool for the top-end of movie-making, commercials and requirements. Its DVCPRO50 tape for- than a year, and at the end of 2006 he As a Headstrong ﬁlm, practically the degenerated to the three of us with • A compelling business case
television production. mat sported good speciﬁcations – more brought me a rough cut and we set ﬁrst decision made was the choice of an HD handicam – ﬂicking switches,
• The ideal medium for television drama, documentaries or commercials,
• Supports full 4:4:4 1920 x 1080 RGB imaging direct to HDCAM-SR compression than DigiBeta but less about ﬁnishing it. camera. Before even reading the script burning stuff and maiming anatomi- HDCAM offers superb full 1080 High Deﬁnition picture performance.
than the miniDV formats – but was cost Rebuilding the cut from DVCPRO50 I had been told we would be shooting cally correct models.
• Can capture and record variable speed images from 1 to 60 frames on a Panasonic Varicam. One of the ﬁrst tests I did was to take • Employs HDCAM format, the "in-house" HD format of choice for
effective in the tape-stock department. tapes, using the utterly corrupt EDLs
per second It was the ﬁrst time I had ever shot some Varicam footage into a high-end broadcasters and production companies around the world (over 31,000
Weirdly (and perhaps worryingly) not generated by Andy’s inﬁrm edit system,
HD, so there was a steep learning curve colour grading suite to see just how units worldwide).
• “ﬁlm user-friendly,” - the camera body is compatible with a variety many people were using it. will live on in my mind as a low point.
of ﬁlm camera accessories including bridge plates, matte boxes and After a hard-fought campaign, we Once we had the movie in Final Cut, to negotiate as I tested the gear. much scope there was for adjustment • Shoot at 24P, 25P or 30P to give your television productions a prestige,
follow focus units. got permission to mix up our formats we spent a few weeks tidying the edit The Varicam kit came from C4 Cam- once the picture was shot. As a result, ﬁlmic look. Alternatively, select 50i or 60i for a more immediate feel.
and shoot sections of the movie on ﬁlm and getting the running length down era in Auckland, and our primary lens we went into the shoot well prepared
– 16mm for Ronnie Roman’s reminis- to a more manageable ﬁgure. was a Fujinon 15x7.3 ‘cine-style’ zoom. – knowing what we could and couldn’t HDW-D1800
cences of past stage-shows, and 35mm Then it became my late-night hobby The camera was pretty straightforward, Continued on page 27
SRW-5500 HDW-D1800 production VTR
'Dual Format' Studio VTR for the ﬁnal few scenes as Ronnie’s story – onlining and grading in Final Cut
reaches its conclusion. and After Effects, until ﬁnally we had • New cost efﬁcient HDCAM VTR
• High quality 1080i, 1080PsF or 720P The SDX900 rewarded us with a a ﬁnished movie – two years after we • Offers 1080 HDCAM recording
recording and playback capability good result. It came with the usual dy- ﬁrst started shooting. and playback at 24P, 25P, 30P,
• 4:4:4 RGB 10-bit recording support namic range limitations and highlight My perspective as DOP evaporated 50i and 60i.
with 12-channel audio clipping hassles, but it recorded motion about a week after becoming the de-
• Compatible replay of MPEG IMX
really nicely – giving any movement a facto online editor. I’ve been working
• Internal format conversion with and Digital Betacam
very ﬁlm-like feel. This really helped on it for so long now, it’s not really a
HDCAM-SR™ & HDCAM™ formats
when it came to cutting the digital movie any more. It’s just a sinister edit • Inbuilt HD to SD down-converter.
footage with the stuff we shot on ﬁlm; timeline that haunts my nights – shot
• Optional HDV (i.LINK) interface
rather than being too jarring, these by shot, frame by frame…
cuts were just a nice subtle change in
richness and texture. The Devil Dared Me To
Sony New Zealand Business Division Sony New Zealand Business Division
DOPing for a ﬁrst-time director who I’m not much of a TV watcher, and I’d
Shane Ormsby 09 488 6135 shane.ormsby@ap.sony.com Shane Ormsby 09 488 6135 shane.ormsby@ap.sony.com
P29/11287
P29/11287
www.sonybusiness.co.nz/hdcamsr www.sonybusiness.co.nz/hdcam
22 JULY 2007 www.onfilm.co.nz JULY 2007
www.onfilm.co.nz 23
DIGITAL FILMMAKING DIGITAL FILMMAKING
Kiss and tell Second time a charm Feverish ﬁlmmaking Gimme Five
Elric Kane and Alexander Greenhough talk about aspects of Writer/director Athina Tsoulis discusses aspects of her A quick chat with Team Good Times, winners of the Wellington Director/producer Amit Tripuraneni discusses his camera choice
Kissy Kissy, which is screening at the 2007 NZ Film Festivals. HD sophomore feature Jinx Sister. leg of the 48HOURS competition two years running. for self-funded feature Five.
I
Elric Kane: Kissy Kissy was self-funded; ploring your options with performances t was privately funded. I just you try and make the savings. was a really useful item.
W
Mathew Knight (DOP): There are hile shooting [previous fea- doesn’t have a native 16:9 chip, so the
the ﬁnal budget came out around and developing new ideas in staging the wanted to get it made… We The advantage [of the format] several reasons 2006’s The Baby Farmer Jeff Hurrell (editor): The post hardware ture] Memories of Tomorrow image resolution was not the greatest as
$2000. Now, that’s with a lot of freebies action. And there’s deﬁnitely no excuse shot on Varicam HD, which in- was that we could shoot pretty fast. and this year’s Mäori Detective and the is a G5 Dual Core with Final Cut Pro we already got to know the we were shooting 16:9 FHA [full height
and favours... to stop until you get it right. stantly doubled my budget. We did I know you can with film, accord- Boogie Fever were shot on a Panasonic 5. The DVX is a great camera, certainly Panasonic DVX102 and felt we could anamorphic] on a 4:3 chip.
We shot it in MiniDV on a Panasonic EK: Except time; time is always against it because it was cheaper than film ing to my DOP Rewa Harre, but as DVX-102 (shooting miniDV) from the best DV camera on the market, and use its strengths while shooting Five. The second disadvantage was the
AG-DVX102A at 25p. This is a much you… – processing is where the costs lie soon as you begin shooting on film, Rocket Rentals. in terms of integrating with FCP it’s a One of its biggest advantages is the inherent low bandwidth and colour
smaller camera than we had worked AG: We wrapped in November 2006, – in the short term. It is also a digital everyone takes more time and you It’s quite a simple camera to use breeze – FireWire in/out with our HDV way it handles natural light and its sampling of the miniDV/DV format,
with in our previous ﬁlms, so it freed us and ﬁnished an assembly in early 2007. format that I was advised was best if need a bigger crew. I could spend but has a quite impressive range of deck. The aspect ratio was 4:3 shot for ability to shoot in low light conditions which meant the camera had problems
up to shoot that many more set-ups per We had a ﬁnal cut after a couple of we wanted to do a 35mm blow up more time concentrating on per- adjustments for its chip size and price. cropped 1:85 /1. All cutting was in real (with the right tweaks in the settings). dealing with the changing light and the
day; in the Marlborough Sounds, espe- months of editing, mostly after hours at a later stage. formance. And I don’t mean more I really like shooting progressive (25p) time as was primary three way colour As a result, about 98% of the movie green spectrum. That obviously was a
cially, it was really good to have a smaller and during weekends. takes. It’s more that we did not have for drama stuff and I particularly like correction. Quicktimes and OMFs was shot with natural light while the huge problem since we were shooting
set-up. But I’ve always loved shooting We cut it on Final Cut Pro at Execam to spend hours waiting for lighting how the cine-like matrix has a really were output for audio post and music night scenes were lit up by candles or in the bush, where it’s all green and the
with this model; for a “prosuma” camera Television and Video Production in and then the finals that need to pleasing colour palette to it. Also in composition at the conclusion of ﬁne gas lanterns. Considering the location light keeps changing rapidly.
it produces quite beautiful images. Wellington. Except for a couple of stray occur. Consequently, the perform- terms of contrast, the DVX’s ‘cinelike-D’ cut, then I did a grade/effects pass while had no electricity it was a huge bonus, If I have to keep making movies out
The quicker set-ups encouraged us booms in the frame that needed remov- ances are pretty amazing. gamma setting gives you the impression the sound was being worked. as we didn’t have to carry a generator or of my own pocket then I will deﬁnitely
to adopt a really ﬂuid handheld camera ing, there was no digital manipulation The other advantage was that that it handles a wider range of contrast The key to workﬂow efﬁciency of lights to make things look good. keep using the same format as it makes
style, which led to a feeling of capturing after shooting. we had a very small crew – three than many video cameras. But a huge 48HOURS is to not stitch yourself up The second advantage was the cam- storytelling possible in an affordable
the events, rather than constructing The sound mix was fairly time in- in the camera and lighting depart- part of the ﬁnal look for our 48HOUR with high deﬁnition, given the end era battery life – since they last a while manner.
them. This was always the aim for this tensive, as we were keen to premiere ment, and about five others. That project was done in post. result must be delivered standard we didn’t have to worry about constantly Ideally, however, I would have loved
ﬁlm, and it’s mirrored, I think, in the it at this year’s NZFF. Luckily we had means less people to get in the way It’s really pretty user friendly. De- deﬁnition 4:3 on DV format. We kept charging them through the day (to to use a Panasonic HVX200 to shoot
ﬂuidity of the performances… a very strong relationship with Dayton of performance, which I do believe pending on the project, you need to be it native the whole way. cover ourselves we rented out extra bat- this movie – mainly because it would
Alexander Greenhough: We’ve always Lekner, our sound editor on our two is central to any film. a little careful deciding whether to shoot Bonnie Slater (producer): We’d ferry teries from A2Z Technologies)... have given us DVCPRO-HD in native
shot fairly conservatively on digital. On prior features – he introduced us to It was not going to be possible to progressive rather than interlaced. For tapes back to Jeff at the end of each The third advantage was that, since 16:9 while still keeping the form factor
ON
our prior ﬁlms we shot on DVCAM, Brett Stanton, who did a fantastic job. create a look with the conventional some projects the strobing aspect of scene we shot so he was cutting while it was miniDV format, we could shoot small, portable and unobtrusive. Plus we
which is pricier than MiniDV, of course, The composer, Stephen Gallagher, tools and we relied on finding good shooting 25p is not always welcome… we were shooting, and his weekend was 60 minutes on each tape and that, could have used different lenses with the
so on Kissy Kissy we had the luxury of did a great job, too, with very little locations in the absence of an art The other factor was the grip gear just as long as ours. It meant [director] combined with the low cost of the M2 adaptor attached – and that would
FILM
a slightly higher ratio because of the time. department as such. We also decided we had access to. Both years we used a Sam [Kelly] could get a few hours sleep tapes, make it a very affordable way to have added a whole new layer to the
cheaper cost; roughly 15-1. There is to go for minimal lighting and used small glide-cam that I could put a DVX before having to start the edit… shoot a feature. visual aesthetics of the movie.
certainly less pressure when you’re ex- For the full Q&A, click here. daylight as much as possible, with a on, but not a larger camera. Since we One of the biggest disadvantages
few red heads and blondes. These had no dollies or cranes the glide-cam For the full Q&A, click here. we faced with the camera was that it For the full Q&A, click here.
decisions were based very much on
the needs of the script as well as
COLLABORATION KEY TO HD
our small finances, so I do not feel f e a t u r e f i l m s
More than 20 producers attended a recent weekend HD seminar sponsored by Panavision, anything was compromised. In fact,
DigiPost and CineGlue. Intended to cover every aspect of HD from budgeting to post, it was I think the film looks great! S U P E R M A N R E T U R N S — Dir: Bryan Singer . DOP: Newton Thomas Sigel ASC
Highly-strung sibling: Sara Wiseman C L I C K — Dir: Frank Coraci . DOP: Dean Semler ACS ASC
centred around three presentations. Roi McGregor spoke about producing a TVC using a I found the Varicam HD very
plays the out-of-control lead character F L Y B O Y S — Dir: Tony Bill . DOP: Henry Braham BSC
Genesis camera for the ﬁrst time, while Matthew Metcalfe discussed utilising the Genesis
in Jinx Sister. user-friendly and would definitely S C A R Y M O V I E 4 — Dir: David Zucker . DOP: Thomas E. Ackerman ASC
on feature The Ferryman (only the ﬁfth ﬁlm to have done so at the time). Both acknowledged
some drawbacks but still intend to use the Genesis again. CineGlue’s presentation involved use it again. However, I tend to be A P O C A L Y P T O — Dir: Mel Gibson . DOP: Dean Semler ACS ASC
mapping out the entire digital pre-production, production, post-production, and deliverables If you costed it out, the financial a bit of a purist and love 35mm. L A M A I S O N D U B O N H E U R — Dir: Dany Boon . DOP: Jean-Marie Dreujou AFC
pipeline. The most compelling point to emerge during the weekend was the need to ensure advantage may not be as big in the Film still has the edge but digital is E M P T Y C I T Y — Dir: Mike Binder . DOP: Russ Alsobrook ASC
your project is a collaborative process and to seek specialist advice from the creative stage long term. However, when you make rapidly catching up. G R I N D H O U S E — Dir: Robert Rodriguez & Quentin Tarantino . DOP: Robert Rodriguez
through to your deliverable format in order to avoid unnecessary problems, particularly in A T I G E R ’ S T A L E — Dir: John Boorman . DOP: Seamus Deasy
post. The sponsors plan more seminars in the near future.
an independent film, the amount of
D E J À V U — Dir: Tony Scott . DOP: Paul Cameron
money you spend up-front is where For the full Q&A, click here. N E X T — Dir: Lee Tamahori . DOP: David Tattersall BSC
T H E L O O K O U T — Dir: Scott Frank . DOP: Alar Kivilo ASC
T H E F E R R Y M A N — Dir: Chris Graham . DOP: Aaron Morton
A S T É R I X — Dir: Frederic Forestier . DOP: Theirry Arbogast AFC
B A L L S O F F U R Y — Dir: Robert Ben Garant . DOP: Thomas Ackerman ASC
B E F O R E T H E D E V I L K N O W S Y O U ’ R E D E A D — Dir: Sidney Lumet . DOP: Ron Fortunado
C O N D E M N E D — Dir: Scott Wiper . DOP: Ross Emery
H I S M A J E S T Y M I N O R — Dir & DOP: Jean-Jacques Annaud
GET EPIC QUALITY ON A TV BUDGET! S L I P S T R E A M — Dir: Anthony Hopkins . DOP: Dante Spinotti AIC ASC
R E V E N G E O F T H E N E R D S — Dir: Kyle Newman . DOP: Lukas Ettlin
T H E C O M E B A C K S — Dir: Tom Brady . DOP: Tony Richmond
THE NEW SONY HDW-F900R CINEALTA CAMCORDER T H E O T H E R B O L E Y N G I R L — Dir: Justin Chadwick . DOP: Kieran McGuigan
I N O W P R O N O U N C E YO U C H U C K A N D L A R RY— Dir: Dennis Dugan . DOP: Dean Semler ACS ASC
The American Society of Cinematographers S U P E R B A D — Dir: Greg Mottola . DOP: Russ T. Alsobrook
21st Annual Awards I K N O W W H O K I L L E D M E — Dir: Chris Sivertson . DOP: John R. Leonetti
Rent now from T H E T O U R I S T — Dir: Marcel Langenegger . DOP: Dante Spinotti AIC ASC
• Full 1080 HD
Nomination in the Feature Film Categor y
• Full CIF (1920x1080) imaging for an Outstanding Achievement Award: d r a m a t i c t v
• Incredible contrast range Dean Semler ACS ASC N I G H T S TA L K E R (SERIES)— DOP: Bob Primes ASC, Rick Maguire & Sandy Sissel ASC (SERIES)
CONVICTION (SERIES)—
• Total creative control for Apocalypto W H AT A B O U T B R I A N
DOP: Ernie Holzman ASC
(SERIES)—
(PILOT) & John Thomas ASC
DOP: Russ Alsobrook ASC & Joe Pennella
(SERIES)
(SERIES)
FA C E L E S S (PILOT)— DOP: Mauro Fiore ASC
• Universally accepted by all major
IN CASE OF EMERGENCY (PILOT)— DOP: Victor Hammer
US and European Networks BROTHERS & SISTERS (PILOT)— DOP: Tom Yatsko
52 FIGHTS (PILOT)— DOP: David Hennings
• Check out
The international www.sonybusiness.co.nz/hdnow
PROTÉGÉ
JUSTICE
(PILOT)—
(SERIES)—
DOP: Adam Sliwinski
DOP: Dermott Downs
HD benchmark (HDCAM links) for programme 3 POUNDS (SERIES)— DOP: Dejan Georgevich ASC
now in NZ! references
P29/11666
P A N A V I S I O N A U C K L A N D — 318 Richmond Road Grey Lynn . Phone 09 360 8770
w w w. p a n a v i s i o n . c o . n z P A N A V I S I O N W E L L I N G T O N — 15 Jarden Mile Ngauranga . Phone 04 470 5500
24 JULY 2007 www.onfilm.co.nz www.onfilm.co.nz JULY 2007 25
DIGITAL FILMMAKING DIGITAL FILMMAKING
says it’s easy but when you start look-
HD storm on course ing at the complexities –1080i, 1080p,
720p, VariCam, frame rates … – all
Steady as he goes: Written,
directed and produced by
Ketzal Sterling (of High
DVT V1P HD Production System
NHNZ’s Michael Stedman and Sony’s David Colthorpe provide a snapshot of the NZ industry’s adoption of HD. those things have a huge bearing on Octane DVD series fame)
the path you take to post-production, “Kiwi gangsta” feature
New Zealand and the rest of the world is “We’re not dogmatic about 1080
A
perfect storm of high deﬁnition But it’s important to start that pro- and that’s where people are coming You Move You Die was
pressures is about to sweep the lessening, with broadcasters preparing – we support both 720 and 1080 – but cess from the end, warns NHNZ man- unstuck.” shot in a total of five days
screen production industry, to transmit in HD from next year. we believe 1080 will be core of the high aging director Michael Stedman. He points out the market wants o n Pa n a s o n i c Va r i c a m
says David Colthorpe, the manager The Freeview consortium has still deﬁnition industry. “One of the things with high deﬁni- and Sony 900 HD camera
content that’s HD-generated, not con-
of Sony NZ’s broadcast & production to ﬁnalise its HD standard for the “Consumer display panels in 2-3 tion is you have to go to the end of the equipment. This feat was
verted from 35mm or Super 16. “The achieved by shooting a
group’s business division. digital terrestrial, or aerial, service it years will only be 1080 … So if you’re process and then work backwards. problem with [conversion] is Super majority of the movie on
“Throughout the world there is will launch but it could to be 1080i receiving 1080, it will display it perfectly “A lot of people grab a hi-def cam- 16 quality is very marginal and nobody Steadicam with very long
a perfect storm of high deﬁnition whereas Sky, with less bandwidth and without interpolation.” era, go out and shoot, then discover wants to make television programmes takes (for eg, intro segment
happening. It’s going to happen on more channels, is opting for 720p. Colthorpe believes the industry there is a whole lot more to it when using 35 millimetre. is a nine-minute one shot
wonder). The film has been Sony HVRV1P HDV camera
a global scale, irrespective of where “Most production companies already punches above its weight with they get to the post area.” “That technology was being used
nominated for best digital 2 x Sony NPF970 batteries
New Zealand is.” would support 1080 as a platform,” its very high-end post-production capa- NHNZ is helping the Screen Coun- before the new generation of hi-def Battery charger / AC adaptor
feature at this year’s NZ
Colthorpe cites the rising popular- Colthorpe says. bility, citing the widespread use of the cil to organise courses on HD, tenta- cameras came out. The cost of the Storm case with foam insert
Screen Awards, with DOP
ity of ﬂat panel TVs with their HD premium mastering format, HDCAM tively scheduled for next month. cameras came down, the quality went Rhys Duncan also tapped for 62mm UV and CP filters
resolution; consumers’ awareness and “Throughout the world SR, at Park Road Post, Digital Post, up, and that means you just don’t want his technical contribution. Vinten Pro 6 Tripod Kit
demand for HD content through the Images Post, and The Toybox. “Multiple formats are For Sterling’s account of Rycote Windjammer
emergence of formats like Blu-ray
there is a perfect storm “There’s been a good uptake in high
to go down the ﬁlm path.”
making the movie, click Wireless microphone system
not a big problem so NHNZ switched to HD generation
(which is built into the new Play- of high deﬁnition hap- deﬁnition shooting equipment. The about ﬁve years ago. Being an early
here. The photo shows Wide angle conversion lens
Sterling and co-star Julian
Station3 games console); the increase pening. It’s going to HDWF900 camera has been embraced long as you set it up at adopter was costly, Stedman acknowl- Harrison.
in bandwidth with compression tech- quite broadly across New Zealand – it’s Purchase for $10,700+GST
happen on a global the beginning of the edges, “but it means we’re now produc-
nologies and the ability to transmit in pretty much the benchmark camera. ing about 80% of everything we do in Lease for $420 per month*
IP technologies; and post-production scale, irrespective of “There’s also quite a few VariCams process. What you shoot hi-def and next year it will be 100%. Digital Devil, Magic the Varicam format still looked great Rent for just $195+GST per day
and production technologies becom- where New Zealand is.” around. They’re not quite hi-def but on will determine what That’s about 60-80 hours a year.” Continued from page 23 on the big screen, and our punchy
ing cheaper and more efﬁcient. have nice over and under speed capa- cartoon treatment translated to ﬁlm
DVT Final Cut Studio 2
“All these fronts are about to col- bility as a creative tool.
you can deliver it on.” NHNZ’s HD costs have reduced rely on the grading process to ﬁx. There
High Definition Edit Suite
ON
from about 50% above standard deﬁni- were no bad surprises. really well.
lide,” he says. “It’s happened already “The bandwidth available on ter- “There’s a lot of XDCAM HD, which tion to 15-20%. “The more hi-def you We graded the movie with colourist
in the United States and Europe. restrial will support 1080 quite easily. is the new professional, non-broadcast “We’re happy to share our experi- do, the lower the cost will become,” Clare Burlinson at RPM Pictures on Compare & contrast
“They were slow to begin but have Also, the production standards are all HD format using Blu-ray disc. ence and to run some one-day work- Stedman says. Final Touch – a system that has since These two projects have really demon-
FILM
now quickly embraced it and got up in 1080, so pretty much everything is “And coming at the end of the year shops that will hopefully stop people “Over the past two or three years been bought by Apple and packaged strated the speed digital acquisition is
to speed with it. shot in 1080. is the new broadcast version, which is ending up in some of the situations we’ve spent several million buying as Color. advancing in quality. In both cases we
“Europe is a very good model for “It’s self-evident that if you’re going to be a huge leap forward. The we’ve found ourselves,” Stedman cameras. We can now do everything in Subtlety was abandoned as we had really good, capable formats (for Quad Core 2.66Ghz MacPro
New Zealand. Obviously they’re on a involved in production and post-pro- XDCAM HD 4:2:2 will be the work- says. hi-def, from idea to delivery.” embraced the colourful, sharp digital their cost), despite them both being 4GB RAM
much larger scale so it’s very hard for duction technology that the future will horse of HD production. “The courses will present you with Among NHNZ’s latest HD series footage, and pushed it further – going formats that were well below the top- 3 x 320GB Video Drives
us to do what they do. be 1080p – progressive capture and “It’s very much similar to what everything you need to know. It’s not are Buggin’ With Rudd (which Prime for an almost cartoon-like look. end available. 2 x Apple 23” cinema displays
“But nevertheless the same factors editing. That’s likely to be the norm standard deﬁnition XD CAM capability that you’re going to walk out of there screens in standard deﬁnition) and Just as we ﬁnished the grade, we But having tried HD, and lenses that Edirol digital speakers
will tend to propagate around the in the next few years. did for the television industry and will an expert but you’re going to walk the Emmy-nominated Equator: Circle received news that we had the funding are a match for the quality of the for- Colour coded keyboard
world and become factors here – and “New devices, like PlayStation3 with be just as affordable.” out knowing what are the questions of Life. needed to output to ﬁlm and get The mat, I would hate to go back to SD. Final Cut Studio 2 including
at an accelerated pace. Blu-ray playback, and potential new Colthorpe says cost isn’t a reason you’ve got to ask before you embark * Final Cut Pro 6
As well as its stunning, cinematic Devil into mainstream cinemas. This The next improvements that come
“If the professional market here protagonists in content delivery, such not to adopt HD, which represents on it, and knowing where you can go * DVD Studio Pro 4
clarity – Stedman likens the SV vs HD meant a whole new raft of tests to see should be really exciting. As a stills * Compressor 3
– producers, broadcasters, post-pro- as telcos with IP delivery, will almost a “huge opportunity” for aspiring to get those answers.” difference to 16mm vs 35mm – HD how our grade was going to translate photographer I have seen what sort of * Color
duction people – don’t monitor this certainly use MPEG4 delivered content ﬁlmmakers. Stedman says the courses are timely futureproofs programmes. “We’ve got to ﬁlm, since we didn’t have the budget image quality difference comes with an * Soundtrack Pro 2
and prepare for it, they may ﬁnd them- and probably in 1080p. “Other things like software – Final given the broadcasters’ move to HD product we made in hi-def seven or for a dedicated grade for ﬁlm. increase in digital sensor size – a move * Motion 3
selves surprised by their competitors “You will tend to compromise your Cut Pro – low-price computers, faster and NZ On Air’s new recoupment eight years ago that’s still selling. So Overall the results were really we’re ﬁnally starting to see in motion Apple Protection Plan
who are looking for opportunities. position if you choose a standard that computers and cheaper hard drives policy, which will encourage more that futureprooﬁng is a very important impressive. The lower resolution of picture cameras. Full system setup, training
“A lot of people in the industry have won’t allow for these new competitors mean you can sit in your spare room producers to seek offshore markets part of our strategy.” and phone support
got this worked out. So it’s important coming in. So 1080 would seem to be at home and script a movie, shoot it for their programmes. But HD is also a more demanding
that others, who don’t have plans, get a sensible standard to adopt.” on a Z1 camera, edit it on Final Cut “And if you’re doing that, you format. “It’s a lot less forgiving than Purchase for $11,990+GST
some plans. Colthorpe acknowledges 720p can Pro on a Vaio computer and put it to have to be hi-def ready and to be able standard def,” Stedman says. “It will Lease for $470 per month*
“The ‘storm’ is perhaps a little omi- be better for movies and sport “but Blu-ray disc. to deliver in hi-def. So a whole lot of show up blemishes, you need to take
nous but it’s something to prepare for 1080i will look equally as good with This system is capable of editing all of
“Indie ﬁlmmakers can have control things are converging.” a lot more care in your lighting and these standard and high definition
and ride with, not batten down for.” the majority of content so it’s not as of the production process from begin- According to Stedman, “There are in a lot of cases you need a lot more formats in real time.
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26 JULY 2007 www.onfilm.co.nz www.onfilm.co.nz JULY 2007 27
DIGITAL FILMMAKING
PJ and the Mysterium Chip Affair As for Jabez Olssen, “I think Peter’s
Continued from page 21 very keen to make Park Road very
the same ﬁles. friendly for the RED camera,” he en-
And so on Friday 13 April, two weeks thuses. “Build up the knowledge and
to the day since the shoot had begun, expertise – it just makes sense.”
Jabez, Richard and Chris boarded a
S
plane to the States carrying a drive o with RED’s ﬁeld test a suc-
each. With the international dateline’s cess for all involved, there’s
assistance they arrived in Las Vegas the perhaps one question left to
same day and handed over the ﬁnished answer. While the appeal of RED’s
ﬁlm to RED’s Jarred Land. high quality and low cost to those
The next day saw Chris helping set without big budgets is obvious, what
up the RED booth’s makeshift theatre drives Peter Jackson’s interest in the
sound system, while Park Road’s Ian format, given his budgets allow him to
Bidgood was on hand to lend his shoot and print several million feet of
expertise in helping set up the Sony 35mm ﬁlm?
4K projector. Jabez and Richard also “I’m curious about the way in which
pitched in to ensure the images that digital images are progressing,” he
screened at NAB matched what they explains. “I like the idea of lightweight
saw in the Park Road DI theatre as cameras. I’ve never worked with an
Rent it closely as possible.
The footage and sound were trans-
ferred onto a digital cinema server and
then on Sunday 15 April Crossing the
Line played to the public at NAB.
The RED booth was the hit of the
show, with the queue to watch the ﬁlm
actor who doesn’t like keeping the
camera rolling and working their
performance up over time. Having
the director yell ‘cut!’ all the time, and
allowing hair and make-up to swoop
in, turns the day into a series of tense
100 yard sprints. I suspect digital will
stretching for hours. allow for a whole different creative
ON O
Jim Jannard found even the big momentum to develop on set.
Hollywood players gobsmacked by the “The digital image quality – from
ﬁlm, with Steven Spielberg asking “Did several different companies – seems to
Peter really shoot this in two days?!” be getting to a place that it can look
FILM
like 35mm, or whatever you want it to
nce back home in NZ, Adam look like. The creative tools in the DI
Scott found his phone run- post-production pipeline are becom-
Photos: Zane Holmes
ning hot with interest about ing so powerful that whether the actual
the project. “The cool thing about capture system is ﬁlm or digital is fast
Shoot it
the whole RED thing,” he notes, “is losing its relevance.
that from that day forward, when “There’s been a general feeling
everybody saw it for the ﬁrst time at within the digital world that 2K resolu- Peter’s friends: Pictured top are Park Road head of DI Adam Scott and technical
NAB, it changed the rules – it’s all tion is just ﬁne, and that’s true,” Peter operations supervisor Phil Oatley, while below are DOP Richard Bluck and editor
changed.” continues. “However, I suspect the Jabez Olssen. “I was struck by how excited these guys all got when talking
about RED,” says this article’s author, Zane Holmes, “and how much fun they
Richard Bluck, meanwhile, has some industry will start to realise that 4K is
seemed to have making the ﬁlm.”
thoughts about how the RED ONE the digital equivalent of shooting in
might help NZ ﬁlm escape being a “cot- 65mm or even Imax and, for some
tage” industry, “where half the people projects, that’s pretty exciting. “If the cost of these ﬁlms can be title sequence of Shortland Street and
have to go off and do something else “Finally, the cost advantages of reduced in any way, it will hopefully acting as co-producer on Maddigan’s
just to survive”. using digital for low budget ﬁlms are allow the studios to relax a little and let Quest. He has also recently joined
“I can only see this as a good thing,” widely accepted. However, at the other some more creative risk-taking sneak forces with Vanessa Alexander
he says. “Having RED as an option will end of the market, the costs of the big back into the genre.” to commence development of
mean that our industry can lose some tent pole movies are rising so fast, the interesting dramatic projects under
of the overhead that can at times be de- risk factor is rising with it. So much so • Zane Holmes is a freelance the banner Collective Vision. Any
Post it
bilitating, and local hire companies and that most of the big event ﬁlms now producer and director with a history feedback about the article or ideas you
individuals can have gear to compete are very studio-driven and franchise- in post-production and visual effects. would like to pitch should be sent to
with the big internationals.” based, rather safe and bland. Recent credits include the opening zane@collective-vision.co.nz.
RED COMING SOON
“there’s just something about the look.”
For further information contact:
Pete Fullerton or Rick Haywood | Panasonic NZ | (+64) 09 272 0100
www.onfilm.co.nz JULY 2007 29